Monday, November 26, 2007

::Announcement::Before I begin the post I would like to mention that on Wednesday this week, we at GRCC are heading down to Kalamazoo to witness a speech by John Stossel at Western Michigan University. Everyone is invited to come. Contact Chaz for more information.

It’s no secret that taxes are necessary for a nation to survive. One cannot have a government at all without at least some taxes. Democrats understand this well. What they don’t understand, however, is that taxes are inherently harmful to whatever they are levied on. Anything taxed is something that will be used less. Tax imports and imports will suffer. Tax small businesses and small businesses will suffer. Tax profit and profit will suffer.

Due to Lansing’s refusal to consider budgeting their money effectively, our state government felt compelled to raise taxes. Of course, they had to come up with creative ways of doing this. First they started a service tax, which will seriously harm our service oriented companies (who provide jobs by the way). Still, this tax was not enough so the Dems thought they would continue with their favorite scheme of “taxing the rich” which always leads to a burden on the poor. We now have a tax on investments in Michigan. If anyone makes more than a certain amount of money through investments, this money will be taxed.

Now the Dems set this number pretty high so as to convince the poor that they are not affected, but we must remember that the overall strength of the economy affects the poor far more seriously than the rich. If we have a weak economy, the rich will have a bit less money, while the poor starve and die. But the economy doesn’t survive on handouts to the poor. The economy thrives on big business creating jobs for the poor to feed themselves. This tax on investments means that any rich man with any bit of sense will invest in any of the 49 other states without such a ridiculous tax. This devastates our economy, and makes the poor starve and suffer. The rich will be fine. They just move away and make profit in another state. But if we had been kinder to the rich, then they could have provided jobs to the poor here in Michigan rather than in Florida.

The rich are not obliged to help the poor. We can make no commands to them. But if we provide a good place for their business the rich will be the best thing the poor ever saw in this state. When will we ever give them the respect they deserve for giving us all jobs and health care and wealth that we may one day make it big ourselves? If we continue to tax all the rich out of our state, we will continue to bankrupt ourselves and ensure a dismal future for all citizens in Michigan, rich or poor.

Wednesday, November 7, 2007

Earlier this week, several members of the GRCC College Republicans joined the College Republicans at Calvin College to listen to a speaker on the topic of radical Islam. The speaker was one Kamal Saleem, and had been a PLO terrorist before converting to Christianity and abandoning his terrorist ways.

Saleem had many good insights into Islam, particularly in its radical forms. He did not speak at length of the 85% of Muslims who are not radical much because his point was that we must be prepared to deal with the radicals. He was careful to mention, however, that only 15% are radicals who want to kill us. Saleem detailed his youth and upbringing in violent ideology as well as his time in America, which he spent converting people here to his version of Islam.

His message was that we must understand Islam and that we must as Christians, show love to Muslims. He stressed that returning hatred with hatred will solve nothing. Now clearly, not all those who agree with his views on Islam are Christians as he is now, but he spoke in a Christian context because not only is he a Christian, but he was speaking to a Christian school.

Saleem’s twofold message of the need for readiness to deal with a bloodthirsty enemy and the need for love for our enemies was particularly impressive. He was not telling anyone to despise Muslims or even that all Muslims are radical. He was simply exhorting us to deal with a dangerous situation appropriately.

Many people misunderstood his message as a message of hate, or a message that Islam is evil. Perhaps part of this is that he was speaking in a Christian context to a Christian school, but mostly I think it is a misunderstanding due to his emphasis on the radicals among the Muslims who are the ones we need to worry about most. There is a lesson here. When someone speaks for any cause, we must see the true motive and discern very carefully whether it is a message of hate, or rather something else. We must be wise and unbiased when we listen to people

Thursday, November 1, 2007

Many people may remember their history well enough to recall the “Red Scare” during the Cold War. The fear at the time was that the communists were infiltrating America, so anyone who was even implicated as a communist was blacklisted. If someone was blacklisted, then his life was destroyed. He lost his job, the world hated him, and sometimes he was prosecuted as a traitor.

Does any of this sound familiar? It sure does to me! I never experienced the Red Scare but I have seen an almost identical. I am referring to the endless accusations of racism happening right now. Just recently, Dog the bounty hunter has been accused of being a racist. As a result, his show has been stopped and he has been ridiculed by the world. But this begs the question: does he have the right to be racist? The answer is, he does. Should his life be destroyed for having offensive views? Of course not. In America, the right to believe what you truly believe is sacred. We don’t necessarily agree with Imus, or Dog or others who hold racist views, but in America, we have no right to persecute them. Dog’s life will probably now be destroyed just as that of Imus was, but this is a great injustice.

We have seen other faces to this problem of liberalism. Those who do not support gay marriage are also said to be bigots. Those who believe that it’s okay for a woman not to work are called sexists. Everyone who does not hold to a liberal view of the world is being demonized. If we hold that women aren’t men and that we have serious moral problems with homosexuality, then our right to believe these things is void. How many men will stand up for our rights? How many will demand that our thoughts and beliefs are ours to have? Will we stand up for justice and fight this “Bigotry scare” which persecutes all those who make a slight mistake?